De Simone: Made in America  it sounds good, but ...

Last year, I spent seven weeks in my native town of Fossacesia, in Abruzzo, Italy (it’s a jewel of a little town bordering on the Adriatic Sea, but the original name of Fossaceca means, “blind hole.” So, what’s in a name?)

After my wife died in October 2010, I really needed to take a few deep breaths of native air. Also, I have lived in America 65 years, but whenever I go back it’s like I never left: My old friends come around and get me involved in many of their activities during the month of August. One year I got to be a judge in a beauty contest preliminary to the Miss World pageant which was to be held in South Africa at Christmas time. I liked that one, even though the girl I picked to win did not come out on top. That’s when I decided to teach an old American song to the rest of the judges: Three blind mice!

Last year, I was also scheduled to receive a number of awards because they consider me one of Fossacesia’s native writers. Well, I am not one who likes to be honored by mere Man. The only time I hope to be honored is when I come face to face with my Maker and He doesn’t kick me off my little white cloud, inviting me to enter paradise, instead. But, there are times when one must go along with the program. So, I went to the city of Pescara to receive whatever it was. But on the way, my grandson made me a surprise gift: a ticket to a new opera that was being given that very evening in the same city, in the open air: La Divina Commedia, no less. So, I opted to go to the opera, instead.

I had scheduled my stay for six weeks except that at the end of the sixth week, hurricane Irene made it necessary for me to delay my return flight for one more week. It was the slowest week of my life. I couldn’t wait to get home. So I got an idea. I decided to count all the American products I could find in the local supermarkets.

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I borrowed my grandson Max’s Ka automobile, that’s a Ford made in Germany. If you bought two of them, you could have a Ka-Ka! I started by stopping at the only gas station left in town, an Esso station. It cost a fortune to fill the Ka’s tank, small as it was. The owner of the station, an old classmate of mine in kindergarten, said the Ka needed oil, so he proceeded to put in two liters of Quaker State Motor Oil.

I drove to nearby Lanciano, site of two popular shopping centers. Coca Cola, Pepsi Cola and Fanta drinks were all over the place. On the other side of the valley I could see the double arches of two McDonald’s. I headed for a pizza place that I remember from the past to have scrumptious pizza. Alas, the pizza was different — very different. I inquired about it and I was told the place had been leased to Domino Pizza.

In the household department there were Palmolive soap, Colgate and Crest toothpaste, Arm and Hammer and Tide detergents, not to mention the ever present American junky music blaring in English from the loudspeakers all over both malls.

From there I went to a book store, a place I used to buy textbooks when I was a student in the city of Lanciano before coming to America. I bought a pen there, a gold-plated Aurora. Finally, I thought to myself, an Italian product. Wrong! It was made in Hungary.

I passed in front of a drug store. I walked in and I looked at various medicines on display. Bayer aspirin, Anacin, Tylenol, Merck products, Glaxco, Smith-Kline products, Johnson & Johnson products — they were all there.

This, of course, brought to mind America’s modern “Buy American” syndrome. It sounds good, and it would be good if America’s big corporations didn’t stretch their tentacles to the farthest corners of the globe.

Simply buying made in America products isn’t going to create many jobs. What needs to be done in order to create jobs is to start programs similar to those FDR created during the Great Depression. There are many infrastructures that need to be replaced in every American city. Many old bridges need to be rebuilt. Rail tracks need to be replaced. Many old homes are sinking or crumbling down, they need to be rebuilt. Let’s do it and put America back to work!

How to pay for it? Simple: “place the cost on the bowed backs of the rich!” All we have to do is create the Order of Knights of Liberty with various medals as decoration, and then fund an endowment dedicated to the rejuvenation of America. Starting with a $10 million contribution, the President would decorate the giver at the White House with a medal: copper (10m), bronze (50m), silver (100m), gold (500m), and platinum (one billion). Create a uniform, too, perhaps with a large plumed hat with red, white and blue feathers. Invite these people to have lunch in the White House and even give a ball in their honor in Washington. Heck, I would even give them a horse! American multi-millionaires and billionaires would gobble it up and they wouldn’t even feel the loss!